Illinois Life Ins. Co. v. Shenehon

• Decision Date: 20 July 1901
• Citation: 109 F. 674
• Parties: ILLINOIS LIFE INS. CO. v. SHENEHON.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Wisconsin

109 F. 674

ILLINOIS LIFE INS. CO. v. SHENEHON.

United States Circuit Court, E.D. Wisconsin.

July 20, 1901

Quarles Spence & Quarles, Theodore K. Long, and Harry Wheeler Stone for complainant.

Bloodgood Kemper & Bloodgood, for defendant.

SEAMAN District Judge.

The question raised by the plea and presented by the testimony is of special importance in this case, for the reason that it may affect the ultimate status of the parties in respect of maintained a bill in equity for the alleged cause of action which appears to be substantially identical in the general facts with the case stated in Insurance Co. v. Cable, 39 C.C.A. 264, 98 F. 761. But this possible aspect of the issue will not justify departure from the well-settled doctrine which governs the determination of citizenship, on which the jurisdiction of this court depends. The complainant is an Illinois corporation, and, if the defendant was likewise a citizen of Illinois when the bill was filed and subpoena served in this district, the federal court is deprived of jurisdiction, and the plea must be sustained. It is true that the allegation of the bill that the defendant is a citizen of Wisconsin makes a prima facie case, and the burden is thus placed upon the defendant to disprove this averment; but the evidence is clear and undisputed of her citizenship in Illinois up to within three months prior to the filing of the bill, and the sole inquiry is whether she came to Wisconsin with the settled intention of making it her permanent home. If her removal was either temporary or tentative, for the purpose of attending to her business affairs, and with the intention of ultimate return to Chicago, as she testifies, or without fixed intention to establish her permanent domicile in Wisconsin, her Illinois citizenship was not terminated, but remained until a new one was acquired by her conjoint action and intention. The rule is such case is well stated in Sharon v. Hill (C.C.) 26 F. 337, 342:

"Citizenship' and 'residence,' as has often been declared by the courts, are not convertible terms. Parker v. Overman, 18 How. 141, 15 L.Ed. 318; Robertson v. Cease, 97 U.S. 648, 24 L.Ed. 1057; Grace v. Insurance Co., 109 U.S. 283, 2 Sup.Ct. 207, 27 L.Ed. 932; Prentiss v. Barton, 1 Brock. 389, Fed. Cas. No. 11,384. Citizenship is a status or condition, and is the result of both act and intent. An adult person cannot become a citizen of a state simply intending to, nor does any one become such citizen by mere residency. The residence and the intent must co-exist and correspond, and though, under ordinary circumstances, the former may be sufficient evidence of the latter, it is not conclusive, and the contrary may always be shown; and, when the question of citizenship turns on the intention with which a person has resided in a particular state, his own testimony, under ordinary circumstances, is entitled to great weight on the point.'

In the early case of Prentiss v. Barton, 1 Brock, 389, Fed. Cas. No. 11,384, the opinion is by Chief Justice Marshall, and of like effect, remarking that:

'All agree that a new residence is not acquired by a residence for a temporary purpose. It must be a permanent residence. Vattel defines it to be 'a habitation fixed in any place, with an intention of always staying there.''

And it is further stated in Vatt. Law Nat. Sec. 218:

'He who stops, even for a long time, in a place, for the

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